


The Three Musketeers

by DarknessAroundUs



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Archie Andrews is a Good Friend, Betty Cooper is a Good Friend, F/M, Friendship, Good Parent Fred Andrews, Investigative Betty Cooper/Jughead Jones, Jughead Jones is a Good Friend, Male-Female Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-26
Updated: 2019-04-29
Packaged: 2020-02-04 15:32:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18607384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarknessAroundUs/pseuds/DarknessAroundUs
Summary: It turns out that Midge is just as smitten with Archie as he was with her, because before the first day of middle school starts, they kiss. It makes Archie feel grown up. When he tells Betty and Jughead, they act like it’s no big deal. He asks them if they know what it’s like to kiss and Betty says very matter of factly “Yes, we do.”It takes a couple minutes for Archie to figure out the full implication of that statement. Even then, he has to clarify with Jughead later and Jughead looks at him as if he’s daft - “Who else would I kiss?”





	1. Archie

**Author's Note:**

> Ever since the Archie, Jughead, and Betty took care of the Red Paladin card as a team, i’ve wanted to read more three musketeers stories. So long story short, I wrote one, and it ended up being way longer than I anticipated.
> 
> This is AU but because we are starting from the very beginning of their friendship, it should all make sense.
> 
> I know the Archie tags are a little confusing, this ends Varchie, and Veronica has a major role in the story as a whole, but Veronica does not enter the plot till the second chapter, 
> 
> Huge thanks are owed to KittiLee for doing an amazing job as a beta reviewing this multiple times and helping me figure out all the plot issues!

Mary dubs them “the three musketeers” before they enter kindergarten. Jughead protests that there were actually four musketeers, because even little Jughead is a stickler for accuracy. But when they try to come up with a different name that suits them as well as that one, nothing comes to mind.

The simple fact is this – they are inseparable, spending every day together. They dig up Fred and Mary’s backyard searching for treasure. They spend an entire week being princesses and another being police officers. They capture frogs and feed them crickets.

Polly is too old for such adventures, but she sometimes keeps an eye on the three musketeers as she reads her books or plays with her Barbies. 

Alice wishes that Betty had found more “appropriate” companions in play, but she doesn’t complain too much because the three are so engaged with each other, they give her time to cook, to clean the house, and to snoop on the neighbors. When she’s older, Alice wishes she made different life choices, but by then it’s too late, the thing she didn’t want to have happen, already has. 

In first grade Archie punches Jason in the gut in order to prevent him from picking on Jughead. He did not expect to injure Jason in any way, Jason is older and bigger than him. Jason cries in the principal's office while Archie looks down at the scuffed toes of his Captain America running shoes.

In second grade, Reggie Mantle ends up with a strange hair cut after picking on Jughead and sitting next to Betty. That same year when Betty gets teased by Chuck Clayton for being a tomboy, Chuck ends up with a black eye, although he never reveals who gave it to him. 

These are just a few examples of something that continues through middle school - one of the three musketeers is bullied, and one of the other musketeers often ends up in the principal's office. The time Betty got caught putting a snake in Dilton Doiley’s backpack is the only tarnish on her otherwise perfect academic record. 

Defending one another is just one small part of their friendship. They do their homework together every afternoon and that is the only reason Archie passes grades two, three, and four. They spend long days biking together and fighting monsters. Every Saturday night they sleep over on Archie's floor until the day Alice deems Betty too old for such things at age nine. Fred tries to fight her on the issue, but he loses.

The summer between elementary and middle school they build a treehouse, sell lemonade, go to Sweetwater River on their own, and lock themselves in a closet so that Betty can bobby pin them out. 

It is this summer, full of long hot hazy days when Archie has his first real crush. All three of them are at Sweetwater. Betty and Jughead are reading Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire to each other on an old wool blanket they stole from the Andrew’s garage. 

Archie cannonballs into the river and swims. At first he front crawls, and then when he’s tired from that he flips onto his back and lazily half kicks. He tries to think of how he would describe the river in a song, but the river is sort of a song, in and of itself. Then he nears the shore, he hears an unfamiliar voice.

He flips in the water and stands up on the stony bottom. To his surprise, between Betty and Jughead there is a girl, one with short black hair, long legs, and a black bikini. It’s Midge Klump. 

Archie knows her, sort-of. She’s always been in the other class at elementary school. But it feels like he’s seeing her for the first time. He loves the way her face looks. He’s so smitten by the time he walks over to his friends on the blanket, he finds himself unable to reply to her friendly “Hi, Archie.”

Only after Betty kicks him discreetly in the shins does he manage a “Hello Midge.” His voice sounds unnatural, strained. Jughead rolls his eyes mockingly. Betty doesn’t say a thing. 

It turns out that Midge is just as smitten with Archie as he was with her, because by the end of the week they’ve kissed. It makes Archie feel grown up. When he tells Betty and Jughead, they act like it’s no big deal. He asks them if they know what it’s like to kiss and Betty says very matter of factly “Yes, we do.”

It takes a couple minutes for Archie to figure out the full implication of that statement. Even then, he has to clarify with Jughead later and Jughead looks at him as if he’s daft - “Who else would I kiss Arch?”.

When Archie tells Fred about his girlfriend, Fred smiles and says, “Oh, I remember that stage, to be young again.” It was funny because young was the opposite of how Archie felt when he held Midge’s hand. 

The relationship as it was lasted a whole four months and fell apart at Halloween when Midge wanted Archie to be the prince to her princess, and Archie felt more like dressing up like a firefighter. 

It all worked out. Within a month Archie had found another girl, Midge being merely the first link in a long chain of girlfriends, from then until their junior year of high school. 

It was nice having girlfriends as part of his life, but it wasn’t the same as having best friends.  
When his parents split, it wasn’t his girlfriend at the time (Tina or was it Ginger?) he went to, but Betty and Jughead. 

Besides eating lunch together every day at school, he would sometimes drag them to football games and open mics at coffee shops. Occasionally they would convince him to help out with what they liked to call “investigations”. Their investigations involved everything from the mystery of the missing lunch money to who was staying in the abandoned house at the end of Elm Street. 

When Betty and Jughead first started investigating Jason’s death, Archie was sure it would be another unsolved mystery. He was so sure that when he put the USB key into the laptop, the last thing he could have possibly imagined seeing, was Jason being brutally murdered. 

But investigations were mostly Betty and Jughead’s territory. They did the legwork, the paper shuffling, the backdoor snooping, and he was brought in only when they needed more help. They acted like it was their job, while he wouldn’t even call it a hobby of his. 

Still, it was one of the few differences between them, that and the fact that they both had home lives they didn’t really talk about. Jughead moved in with Archie permanently during their sophomore year after FP was incarcerated. 

Archie was pretty thrilled. It made it easier to see Jughead and he and Fred all got along well. Sometimes in the morning when they all wanted to shower it was a pinch, but mostly it was an easy transition. 

Betty’s father leaves town during the summer before their junior year and she starts to use her bedroom window more than the front door to access her house. Archie doesn’t really know what to say - “Sorry your mom is so crazy,” while accurate, seems insufficient (a word Betty taught him in preparation for the SAT’s). 

He sometimes sees Betty in the kitchen talking to Fred about it. He wishes she would come to him with her problems, but he is sure his father has better advice for her than he would. Archie has lots of faults, putting the toilet seat back down is one of them, but he’s never been bad at sharing. 

Archie starts dating Valerie in the spring of junior year. She is funny and charming. She becomes the person he shares his music with first, in part because she is also a musician.

Valerie wasn’t the biggest fan of Jughead and Betty. She preferred to spend lunch with Archie only. When he asked her about it, all she would say is that it wasn’t normal to be that close to friends, it made her uncomfortable. He tries not to talk about them too much to after that. 

Archie still sees Jughead and Betty a lot, just not quite as much as he had before. One night he arrives at their normal booth in Pop’s to discover his two best friends kissing. He can’t help but exclaim loudly. They both look up at him a little shocked. Betty’s lipstick is smudged and Archie can see some of it on Jughead’s upper lip. 

“How long has this been going on for?” He asks, sitting down with a thump across from them.

“Since middle school.” Jughead says with a shrug, but Archie doesn’t really hear him because he’s got his fingers stuck in his ears by then. He’d rather not know. 

They’re still his best friends, they go to the movies and Pop’s and even sneak into parties together. If Jughead and Betty are still kissing, it’s not that obvious to Archie. They don’t kiss in front of him, and if they do hold hands it seems friendly, the way they used to hold his hand when he was younger. 

Archie treats whatever relationship Betty and Jughead are in (or not), the way he treats their investigations, it’s none of his business unless they tell him something specifically. Sensing his reticence, they don’t involve him in either.

Archie and Valerie attend two different music camps that summer but somehow keep their relationship going long distance. Betty and Jughead bring a murderer to justice in Archie’s absence. They land jobs at Pop’s, both taking the late shift. They always seem groggy over facetime. Sometimes Betty is wearing one of Jughead’s S t-shirts. Archie tries not to read too much into that.

Archie and Valerie stay together long enough to go to prom. Betty and Jughead are too busy trying to find someone they call the Sugarman to go. A month later when Valerie and Archie break up because they are going to separate schools, Archie decides not to pack his prom photos.

Betty and Jughead get into Columbia and Archie gets into NYU. When he tells his mom he’s moving in with Betty and Jughead, Mary asks if he’s just going to NYU because of Betty and Jughead. Archie’s really not sure how to answer that question. When he tells his dad what his mom says, Fred just laughs and shakes his head, “Your mom just doesn’t get it son.”

Mary’s reaction has nothing on Alice’s, who writes Betty out of her will for moving in with “Not one, but two boys! What are you thinking Elizabeth?”

They can only afford a two bedroom. Archie doesn’t mind. He and Jughead have shared a room for years now. It’s not exactly a problem. Except it becomes one, sort of. 

Archie meets Sabrina at orientation. She’s a tiny, beautiful blond with a sharp tongue. It takes him two months to convince her to date him, but eventually she capitulates after he gives her one of Betty’s special homemade cupcakes. 

He doesn’t tell her Betty made the cupcake. Because of what both Mary and Valerie have said, he tries to keep the fact that he is linked at the hip to his childhood besties on the downlow. It seems easier to omit them, then to explain them.

Archie brings Sabrina home for the first time on a cold November afternoon. They have the apartment to themselves, and Archie puts a sock on the door when they go to sleep that night, thinking that Jughead will just sleep on the sofa. 

When Archie wakes up in the morning, Sabrina is already gone, and he’s surprised to find that the living room is empty. Jughead for once in his life must have gotten up early. 

Archie brews coffee and takes his first sip just as Jughead exits Betty’s bedroom in boxers, a hickey on his chest. Archie can’t stop himself from spitting his coffee out onto the counter in shock. 

Jughead just shakes his head and goes to the bathroom. Betty makes them pancakes and Archie chooses to focus on that. 

The upside is that Jughead seems to have permanently moved into Betty’s bedroom after the incident. Archie only thinks of it as an upside because Sabrina has more roommates than he does and her cat hates him, so his place works better. But from this point on it seems indisputable that Betty and Jughead are at the very least hooking up. 

One afternoon, a few weeks before Christmas, Archie and Sabrina are basking in a post-coital glow when Sabrina sits up and points at the twin bed in Archie’s room as if she’s only just noticed it, “Who sleeps there?” she asks. 

“Jughead.” Archie says. He’s only mentioned Jughead and Betty in the context of roommates to her.

“Where does he stay when I’m here?” Sabrina asks. 

“With our other roommate Betty.” Archie decides not to mention that Jughead also stays with Betty when Sabrina is not there.

“So he and Betty are dating?” Sabrina asks. Archie’s never been bold enough to broach this subject with Betty and Jughead. It just feels too awkward. After all, if he knows they’re dating it’s like acknowledging that he is the third wheel, and not one of the three musketeers.

“No.”

“So they’re hooking up?”

Archie's pretty sure he’s blushing. He’s not sure that is the right term for it either, but it seems safer to say “Maybe.”

“Oh. For how long?”

Archie starts doing the mental math and then gives up and says “Since middle school.”

“On and off?”

“I don’t actually know.” Archie says, pressing his lips against her neck. He wants this conversation to be over now, and he chooses the right strategy to end it. 

Jughead ends up selling the twin bed on Craigslist that week. 

“Am I living with a couple now?” Archie sighs while they watch Parks and Rec that night. 

“That depends on if your still in denial about that fact that we’re a couple?” Jughead says, Betty’s legs resting on his lap.

Archie doesn’t answer. Instead he asks “Are you going to start kissing in front of me?” over April Ludgate’s lines. 

“Only if you start noticing.” Betty says, kicking him lightly. 

Over Christmas break they all return to Riverdale, but they all stay at the Andrews house. Alice has sold her house next door, and that makes the visit less awkward.

Fred had cleared out Mary’s old office for Jughead and Betty, and he makes a big deal about how they are always welcome to stay in that room. 

On the first night back Fred and Archie sit on the back porch, each drinking a beer, and Archie asks his dad how long he’s known about Betty and Jughead. 

“For a long time.” Fred says with a shrug.

“How did you find out?”

Fred grimaces slightly and then asks “Do you really want to know?”. Archie shrugs but nods a yes.

“Well, I heard strange noises coming from the treehouse.”

“No, no, no!” 

Fred laughs at Archie’s reaction and pats him lightly on the shoulder. The holiday goes well, it feels like an actual celebration. All of them exchanging gifts and Betty cooking way too much food. Archie enjoys the feel of it, the fact that Fred is so comfortably a part of it all. 

Arche’s relationship with Sabrina survives the holiday break, and while he spends more and more time with Sabrina and her friends, she doesn’t seem particularly keen on spending time with Betty and Jughead. They’ve met by now but only briefly. 

Betty and Jughead are busy too, although Archie isn’t exactly certain what kind of degrees they are getting. He’s sure Columbia doesn’t have a degree in criminal investigations, but both of them get their PI license and spend a lot of time out of the apartment tailing people. 

Archie runs into Jughead at a nice Italian restaurant and Jughead refused to acknowledge him at all. Only later did Jughead inform him it was a job.

It’s hard on Archie, spending less time than usual with them, but Betty institutes a weekly family dinner, and they spend lazy Sunday mornings together. Besides, for the first time in his life Archie feels like he might have actually figured out how to sustain a relationship. 

Then one morning right before summer break, Archie comes out of his bedroom to Sabrina confronting Betty about taking the last of the coffee, but before Archie can properly understand what is going on, Betty is apologizing with an Alice Cooper approved smile. She leaves right after that.

“What happened?” Archie asks Sabrina, who now has her own cup of coffee, although it is only half full. 

“Betty doesn’t like me.” The look on Sabrina’s face unsettles Archie in a way he can’t explain.

Archie laughs, in his whole life of knowing Betty she’s never really not liked anyone, and even if she doesn’t like someone, she certainly isn’t mean to them. Reggie once stole all her chemistry notes and she still fixed his car a month later. 

Archie asks Betty about Sabrina that very day, and all Betty says is “She’s your girlfriend. I wouldn’t be mean to her.” 

Although it isn’t the same thing as liking someone, it’s a start. Betty refuses to give Archie any details about the situation though. 

The next time he sees Betty and Sabrina interact they’re all watching TV together late one night, both Betty and Sabrina appear polite and reserved. Jughead on the other hand refuses to answer any of Sabrina’s questions and instead pouts like a little kid. 

The next day when he and Jughead are playing video games, Jughead turns to him and says, “Why do you have to date such a massive bitch?”

“What has she done to you?” Archie asks slightly shocked, pausing the game. 

“It’s not about me, it’s about Betty.”

“What has she done to Betty?”

“Stole her expensive cherry blossom shampoo, moved her meds, dumped her coffee down the sink once, accused her of liking you.” Jughead pauses. “I could go on, but Betty would be mad at me. She didn’t want me to tell you even this much.”

“Why not?” Archie asks. After all it’s not like he would be taking this any less seriously if Betty herself was telling him this. 

“That Alice Cooper instilled sense of decorum of hers.”

“Fuck that.” Archie says. Betty’s not home, but Sabrina’s coming over any minute. “I’m going to talk to Sabrina about this.”

“Now?” Jughead raises both eyebrows. Archie nods. Jughead clears out. 

Sabrina comes over all smiles, but her face falls as soon as she sees Archie’s expression. The fight is loud and terrible and involves a whole lot of denial on Sabrina’s part. It’s only in the last two minutes of the fight that they really get to the meat of the argument. 

“I just feel like your choosing them over me.” Sabrina complains. Mascara is streaking her face and Archie finds it distracting. 

“That’s because I am.”

He expected the break up to hurt more than it does. That night while he’s eating dinner with Betty, he asks her over ramen why she didn’t tell him about Sabrina herself. “I just didn’t want to seem rude or petty, Arch.”

“Betty, you are neither of those things.”

“Besides I get it, she was the new person coming into an established situation, it can be nerve wracking, intimidating.”

“Still not an excuse.” Archie says slurping up a noodle. 

“I want you to have what Jug and I have.”

“I’m not ready for what you and Jughead have, whatever that is.” 

Betty laughs and sets her soup spoon down gently. “Fair enough.”

The rest of college passes more or less without incident. Archie doesn’t involve himself seriously with anyone, instead he discovers Tinder and has lots of fun.

Jughead and Betty marry right after college. Only Fred, Polly, and Archie attend, but it’s a good day ending in burgers and milkshakes. Betty and Jughead move to Westchester county, buy a house and start their own business. 

Archie feels like they’re fast tracking towards a future that has nothing to do with him. Still they come into the city for fun weekends, and drag him up to Westchester for hikes and video game marathons. 

Sure, they wear rings now and occasionally talk about their mortgage. But most of the time they’re the same people they were a decade ago, obsessed with what the neighbor’s might actually be up to and ready to stay up all night and watch movies. Committed to supporting him when he actually needs it, and teasing the hell out of him when he gets too cocky. 

Archie makes it a year in the city on his own, before he decides it’s not worth it anymore. Hook ups seem more shallow when they aren’t balanced out by weightier relationships.

So he gets a job teaching music at a high school in Yonkers and moves into the Mother-in-law suite above Betty and Jughead’s garage. The one he’s pretty sure they had built for him.

The years pass and Archie continues teaching and dating “casually”. Betty and Jughead have two children, Thea and Elliot. They now work full time doing whatever the hell they were doing in undergrad. They call themselves “consultants”. 

Sometimes life feels like it hasn’t changed at all, even though instead of being the third wheel to a couple, Archie’s now the fifth wheel to a family - or as Thea once put it at age four, he’s the “above garage uncle”.

Still he’s grown used to it. It’s handy to be the above garage uncle. He helps with the fun parts of childcare (lots of park excursions and video games, no forced vegetable eating or baths). He and Betty run together in the morning, and he and Jughead play video games late at night. Fred visits once a month and Betty and Jughead’s kids call him Grandpa. No one ever corrects them. 

Archie cooks his own food occasionally, he’s an adult after all, but mostly he just eats whatever Betty’s made with the rest of the family. 

Girls sometimes call him on this, but that’s always a sign that they want to get more serious, and frankly he can’t see the point. 

It’s the eve of Archie’s 39th Birthday, Thea and Elliot went to bed a long time ago. They’re out on the back lawn. Jughead’s smoking, an occasional vice, and they’re all staring up at the sky, exchanging occasional words about their week. It’s slightly cool out, but in a pleasant way after a long hot day.

“How does it feel to turn 39, Archie?” Betty asks. 

“I won’t find out till tomorrow.” Archie says with a shrug. But it’s not entirely true. His life the last decade or so has mostly involved a string of beautiful available women, and a lot of whatever the hell he wants to do, be it video games or staying up to 3 in the morning writing songs, but lately the freedom of it all, has felt less like freedom and more like monotony.

He hates to say it, but he finds himself wanting a challenge. When he overheard Betty and Jughead talking about Elliot being bullied in school the other day, he had thought, I wonder what I would do in their shoes, when just a few months ago he would just be grateful that he had no responsibility in terms of the situation. 

“Besides Jughead will know what it feels like in a month.” Archie says, leaning even further back in his chair. 

“Don’t remind me.” Jughead says, but his tone is lighthearted. 

When Archie sees the first shooting star, it’s so bright and fast at first he thinks he’s imagined it, but then there is another one and another one. 

“Holy….” Archie says. He glances over at Betty and Jug, but they are positioned just like he is in their deck chairs, necks stretched back. He focuses again on the sky. Minutes pass, still more stars fall. Archie feels both immersed and transported. Like he never wants to be in a moment better than this, and also that this moment is beyond him. 

The meteor shower slows, and then stops. “What did you wish for?” Betty’s voice says, catching Archie by surprise and grounding him to here and now. Archie re-focuses on his two best friends. Betty is covered in blankets, feet curled up on her seat, and Jughead’s legs are uncovered and sticking straight out. In the dim light they both look like they did two decades ago. 

“Nothing.” Jughead answers, his hand reaching out for Betty’s. 

Archie doesn’t answer out loud, but his thoughts supply him with plenty of wishes he isn’t ready to put into words. He looks at Betty’s hand in Jugheads. 

It took him a while to adjust to the fact that his two best friends were more than that to each other, but now he sees them for what they really are, what they always were, partners and lovers, people who knew each other as well as they knew themselves. Motherfucking soulmates. 

They didn’t need to wish for anything more than what they already had. Because what they have almost everyone else wants. Now for the first time, Archie can admit that he wants it to. 

Archie wakes up on the morning he turns 39 and realizes one way or another he has to drastically change his life before he turns 40. Even if it involves moving out.


	2. Betty, Veronica, and Jughead

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So much gratitude is owed to KittiLee for being the best beta anyone could ask for and really helping me with this second chapter, which was a battle, from a writers perspective.

Betty is running with Archie a week after his birthday, when she first notices it. Something is up. His shoulders look tight, his jaw is set. She doesn’t know what to say. That night as Betty washes the dishes and Jughead’s scrubbing the counters. He tops and asks “What’s wrong with Archie?”

“I don’t know.” Betty says turning off the tap and walking over to Jug. “He hasn’t told me anything, but something is off.”

“Do you think he’s developing feelings for someone?” Jughead asks. He puts a hand gently on her hip as he asks it, his tea towel abandoned. 

“No. It’s been a while, but I think I still remember the signs. I think it’s something else.”

“What?” Jughead asks. His expression is so open, she knows that he’s thinking about how they can make whatever Archie’s going through better. But that’s not how life works, always.

“I think he’s ready for something more. He just doesn’t know how to get there.”

A smile seizes Jughead’s face, “Fucking finally.” Betty can’t help but laugh.

Betty’s life is full of good things, lazy Sunday mornings where the kids watch TV and they get to cuddle in bed with coffee. Date nights with bottles of wine and long conversations about Chandler. Work evenings where they are on the verge of solving something, they’re just not sure what. Long walks with the kids through mud puddles. Hide and Seek with Fred and Archie. 

Most of those things she shares with Jughead. Lots of those things they share with their children, and only some of those things does Archie get to be a part of. 

Their friendship is one of the best things in all of their lives, but it can’t replace a romantic relationship, or the one of a parent with a child. The more Betty thinks about that fact, the more she wants to fix it.

Betty can’t remember meeting Jughead. They became friends in a time before memory exists. She can remember kissing him for the first time in the woods behind her house, but she can’t remember falling in love with him then, because love is something that already existed between them. Never in her life has she looked for a partner, because she always had one.

Now she finds herself in supermarkets, at the school pick up line, and at work, looking for a partner for Archie. 

She rather embarrassingly makes and shares a Google doc with Jughead of all the qualities Archie’s ideal partner should have. At the top of the list, underlined and in bold is the sentence, “They must like us”.   
Jughead laughs when he reads that. “Are you implying that Sabrina was the right partner for Archie, or would have been if she just liked us?”

“No.” Betty snaps, and then more honestly adds “Maybe.”

“He wouldn’t have let her go that easily if that was the case.” Jughead says, resting a hand on her shoulder. “So please, if you’re still feeling guilty about it, stop.”. Betty does, but it doesn’t help her find anyone who might work for Archie.

The only potential candidate Jughead finds ends up being a lesbian in a committed relationship. Betty thinks he’s not taking it seriously enough. Not that she’s doing any better. She doesn’t want to lose Archie to apathy or angst. Every time they run, his shoulders appear tighter.

Still she teaches him how to roast the perfect chicken, and he teaches Thea how to play row row row your boat on the piano, and they all go camping and Archie somehow manages to catch a fish. 

Some moments, particularly with the kids, or after a good meal, he seems like the Archie she’s known her whole life. Easy going, funny without always meaning to be, dependable to a fault, but other times, he seems withdrawn, full of something he isn’t putting into words.

She notices him drinking a little too much, being quicker to anger than he ever was before. It worries her. 

When she and Jughead come back from a week away working a high priority case, they find him fighting with the nanny they’d hired in their absence about video games. There is no humor in their argument. 

Archie shuts up as soon as he sees them, but that night before they go to bed, Jughead says, “You’re right. We need to find him someone to share his life with.”

“Why couldn’t you have said that a month ago?”

“Sometimes I’m a slow learner.” Jughead says lightly, pressing his hand against her stomach. It’s so cold she screams and retaliates with tickles. 

Still it’s hard. It seems like most smart, funny, beautiful women are already taken or not interested.

Then, about two months into the search for Archie’s partner, Betty is cheering on Elliot from the sidelines as he kicks the ball. She loves being a soccer mom. 

If someone told the fifteen year old version of herself that being a mom was one of her callings, she would have politely shaken her head while thinking something snarky. 

Fred was the only reason she was brave enough to attempt becoming a parent in the first place. She told him her doubts and fears once when he was visiting them, he told her that she was as far from Alice as the north pole was from the south.

It was far from the first (or last) time he reassured her. Whenever Betty complains about their lack of role models for parenting, Jughead is quick to remind her of Fred. He’d adopted them both in his own way.

Betty knows she isn’t a terrible mother because of how Elliot and Thea confide in her. The amount of time they spent snuggled into her side. The way that their bodies didn’t tense when she got angry. 

Elliot scores a goal and Betty screams with joy. If Jughead were here right now he’d be making so much fun of her. If Archie were here, he’d be screaming twice as loudly as she was. But it’s early in the season still, so it’s just her. 

The game restarts and Elliot kicks the ball to his team mate Max, a small boy who looks more dignified than any five year old Betty has ever met, even in a stained soccer jersey and cleats. 

A woman walks over to Betty. She’s short but strikingly beautiful, with dark brown hair and piercing eyes, but what Betty notices most about her is that she’s wearing a string of pearls. Betty’s never met anyone under 60 that wears pearls like that, and certainly not to a kiddie league soccer game.

“Is that your son?” the woman asks, pointing at Elliot.

“Yes.” Betty says. “Are you Max’s mom?”

“Yes, I’m Veronica.” As Veronica introduces herself, someone on the opposing team tackles Max like it’s football not soccer. Veronica charges onto the field high heels and all, yelling. 

The parent of the other child comes onto the field as well, to defend him of all things, and the coach isn’t intervening at all, and even though they are only halfway through the game, Betty feels strongly that kid’s sports should not be like this. 

So she marches out onto the field, grabs Elliot’s hand and turns to Veronica and says “Why don’t we just get out of here?”

Suddenly, the coach is very much involved. While Max isn’t much of a player, Elliot is their top scorer, but Betty’s no longer interested in hearing the coach’s opinion. She waves him off with her hand and the expression she usually reserves for hardened criminals. 

Neither boy seems to mind, and Betty frankly feels invigorated by the time they make it to the parking lot.

Veronica turns to her and says, “Do you want to go get burgers at Joe’s, my treat?”. In that moment Betty is struck with love at first sight. It’s not romantic love, her heart had been taken in that regards a long time ago, but she feels the love that comes with friendship. 

She’s not used to that. Betty made her two best friends before her memory started, so this sort of thing is new for her.

“As long as you let me pay for the milkshakes.” Betty says. 

Veronica’s smile is bright and in that second a memory shifts into place, like a key into a lock. Betty realizes that while this is her first time meeting Veronica, it’s not her first time seeing her. 

She remembers looking at Veronica four years ago across a crowded courtroom. They were both witnesses for the prosecution. Veronica was testifying against her husband, a mob boss Betty and Jughead had helped catch. 

“You’re Veronica Grade.” Betty says, her hand still in Elliot’s.

“Not anymore. I’m Veronica Lodge once again.” Veronica says, looking shocked. “How did you know?” But before Betty can even answer the question, Veronica figures it out “You’re Betty fucking Jones.”

“The one and only.” Betty smiles back. She’s used to struggling to explain exactly what she does for a living, but Veronica, having seen her give her testimony knows all that already. 

She also realizes that Veronica isn’t going to hold that against her, this is another point in her favor. 

Betty’s never had a close female friend before, and Veronica quickly fits into that role in a way Betty could have never anticipated. It helps that they’re both mothers with limited time, but somewhat flexible schedules. 

They start going out for coffee once a week and end up spending most afternoons at the park with their kids. Betty realizes pretty quickly how Veronica might fit into her life in a greater and more permanent way. How she might have finally found the right partner for Archie. She has to run Veronica by Jughead first. 

Veronica comes over one night to pick up Max and Betty offers dinner. Jughead already has plenty of burgers on the grill and Veronica agrees. 

When they first sit down to eat, Jughead and Veronica are both a little cold to each other. They’ve both heard a lot about the other from Betty, but outside of exchanging children quickly, they’ve never really talked.

Plus Jughead’s naturally wary of strangers. He’s never been as social as Betty. No one ever trained him to be polite, and frankly he’s never seen the point. 

Halfway through dinner, Veronica calls him Smughead when his mouth is fully occupied by a burger and he has no hope of replying. 

Betty can tell that he likes being put in his place. He’s always appreciated honesty, and now he knows that Veronica’s honest. That aside from the pearls and designer shoes, there stands a fighter. Someone fierce and willing to stand up for themselves, much like him. After dinner he offers her a cigarette and she accepts. 

All three of them sit on the back porch talking after the kids fall asleep. Betty sits away from the smoke and watches as the two of them have a lively debate about Audrey Hepburn. 

That night in bed, while they are lying in spoons Jughead says “I think you’re right about Veronica and Archie.”

“Of course I’m right, I’m the wife. The wife is always right.”

“That’s not a thing you know?” Jughead says raising an eyebrow. “You’re not right because you’re my wife, you’re right because you’re you.”

When she turns to face him, he kisses her on her forehead and then the tip of her nose, and then on her mouth, where her lips push back against his. 

“You’re such a softie.” Betty says when he pulls away, although his face stays close to hers. 

“I’ll have you know that I have a reputation as quite the opposite in some circles.”

“I’m glad I’m not in those circles.” Betty says. “Although Veronica told me the nickname the FBI gave us and it’s not exactly bad ass.”

Jughead raises both eyebrows questioningly. “So what is it?”

“The lovebirds.”

“Really?” Betty knows how to read Jughead’s expressions well, that’s how she knows he’s torn between exasperation and delight. “Even after we took down that one serial killer in Wyoming?”

Betty nods and Jughead kisses her again. It’s a different kind of kiss, his lips pressing into her collarbone. 

“Are you trying to prove them wrong?” Betty asks.

“Hell no.”

Still, even though she knows Archie will love Veronica, and Veronica will love Archie, Betty wants to set this whole thing up right. She doesn’t rush into anything. Instead she’s very careful about what she says to Veronica about Archie and vice versa. She sets the stage so to speak, and then before she knows it it’s Elliot’s sixth birthday party and it’s time for her plan to be put into action. 

***

Veronica loves Betty, she really, really does. In a way that goes beyond friendship and is more like what family should be. 

But sometimes on days like this, where Jughead is there, his arm almost permanently looped around Betty’s side, and the house they live in is decorated to look like something out of Martha Stewart Living: Booklovers Special Edition, and everything seeming so nuclear family idyllic, Veronica could scream. 

But it’s Elliot’s birthday party, and she loves Elliot, and more to the point Max loves Elliot, (and cake), so Veronica is there, in her best casual sundress, with a smile pasted on her face she knows Betty can see through. 

Still she greets the other parents, all paired off with partners, as if she is genuinely happy to see them. When one woman she knows from soccer pulls out her phone to show her pictures of this “perfect couples retreat” it grows to be too much, and Veronica goes to the kitchen to hide out. 

Jughead’s already there, mixing drinks and entertaining Thea who declares herself “Too big to enjoy little kid parties”. 

Jughead must be able to read Veronica’s expression pretty well because he hands her an extra strong mojito and says, “If you want to go outside for a second and clear your head, I hid some cigarettes in the base of the sundial.”

When Veronica first met Jughead she wasn’t sure if she liked him. His guarded nature and combat boot aesthetic was a little off putting to her. But he’d changed her mind pretty quickly, with his sharp and careful wit, by the way he took to Max, the way he loved Betty. 

“I’ll take you up on that offer.” she says, unlatching their back door and going out into the garden. The sundial, also known as Jughead’s not so secret smoking spot, was in a grove of trees in the back of the Jones’s very large backyard. 

Veronica lifts up the base of the dial to reveal a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. She takes one out of the packaging and is just lighting up when she hears a man say, “Hey Jug, are you back here?”

“No.” Veronica responds just as the man comes into view. He’s tall with orange hair and broad shoulders. He’s probably Jughead and Betty’s age but he seems younger. As cliché as it seems, she’ll admit her first thought about him is he’s handsome. 

“Oh, hey.” he says, a look of surprise crosses his face and then an even bigger smile “You must be Veronica.”

“And you must be the above garage uncle.” 

Archie laughs. It’s a good laugh. Deep and low. “I go by Archie, but yes.”

“Max loves you.” Veronica says. She finds it strange that Max has met this man before but she has not. She has certainly heard a lot about him. Betty and Jughead’s best friend since birth, the lovable, laid back music teacher. 

“It’s good to finally meet you.” Archie says, and she knows then that he’s been as curious about her as she has been about him. “I didn’t know you smoked.”

“I don’t usually. It’s just an occasional bad habit. It was getting a little Stepford-y in there for me. Do you smoke?”

“No.” Archie says with a shake of his head. “But I get what you mean about Stepford. Sometimes I feel like the odd man out in family suburbia.” 

Veronica notices how his eyes gleam with mischief.

Then Archie says, “You know they’re not actually perfect right?”

“The lovebirds fight?” Veronica says, arching an eyebrow. She’s shocked to hear that. It’s not like she’s known them for more than six months, but sometimes those two are so sympatico it’s scary. She’s seen them have an entire conversation without a single word, or even an exaggerated expression. 

She had to fake a happy marriage with Elio for years, and she thinks she’s gotten pretty good at seeing through any masks people may be wearing.

Archie looks shocked, then laughs. “If they do fight, it’s not much. I meant you must know Betty and Jughead aren't all bake sales and PTA.”

“Oh, I know.” Veronica says, although sometimes she forgets. They are good parents as well as good consultants. “I was married to one of the mob bosses they brought down.”

“One of….” Archie doesn’t finish that sentence. “I try not to pry into their work too much.”

Veronica feels a smile play on her lips, but instead of giving into it she takes another puff of her cigarette. “I understand completely.”

They’re the only two single people at the party, but that’s probably not the only reason they gravitate to each other. 

She likes watching how good Archie is with Max first hand. With Betty and Jughead, Archie acts a bit like the little brother. Close to both of them, and a little adoring.

Over lunch Archie tells her all about what goes into writing a song and Veronica actually finds it interesting. 

At the end of the afternoon, after sneaking a kiss instead of a smoke, Veronica returns to the kitchen to see Betty elbow deep in suds, cleaning the dishes. Only then, when she sees the smug smile on Betty’s face does she realize that this was a set up. 

She doesn’t give Betty the satisfaction of knowing how it worked out then, although she’s sure Archie spills the beans after she leaves. 

Veronica always swore up and down if she ever got involved with anyone ever again it would be slow and steady. She wouldn’t do overnights for a year and she would wait six months before introducing Max. With Archie everything was turned on its head. 

Archie already knew Max well before he met Veronica, and overnights were so easy with Max sleeping over all the time anyways at the Jones’s. She meets Fred in the first month that they are officially dating. Fred is welcoming, soft spoken and quick to embrace Max. 

Somehow within six months of their first date (a jazz concert in a nearby town), Archie moves in with Veronica. Thea and Elliot cry and Max looks like he’s won the lottery. It’s all short lived because three months after that the house next door to Betty and Jughead’s goes on the market. 

They buy it right away. Before they even move in, they get rid of the fence. It just makes sense to move in next to Betty and Jughead. Everyone is so close that they eat dinner there three times a week already. 

Even though Archie, Jughead, and Betty have known each other forever, Veronica always feels included. Sometimes they have to get her up to speed on inside jokes, but mostly she just fits in seamlessly. She wonders sometimes what it would have been like to grow up with them in Riverdale. To have such strong friendships when she was young would have done her good.

Veronica’s never been in love before. What she had with Elio was arranged by both their parents. She feels happier than she’s ever thought possible, giddy with everything she’s experiencing for the first time.

The first evening in their new house, half their stuff is still in cardboard boxes around them and they’re in bed. Veronica is lying on Archie’s chest, his hand wrapped around her waist. Both their names are on the deed and she finally feels brave enough to say “You’re the only person I’ve ever loved.”

“Really?” Archie asks. She can’t see his face, but she can hear his skepticism.

“Really.” 

“Me too.”

“What?” Veronica’s shocked. She sits upright. She knows that Archie’s been with a lot of women. They’ve had enough awkward encounters with girls around town to prove that point. He’d never really mentioned anyone special, but she’d always assumed. She’d even tried to get him to talk about it a few times.

“You’re the love of my life.” Archie says softly sitting up beside her, putting his arms around her again. “Before you, I hadn’t been in a real relationship since college and even that wasn’t particularly real.”

“Oh.” Veronica exhales. 

Archie stands up and goes over to his newly moved in set of drawers. In just his boxers, he shuffles through the top drawer and then pulls out a small turquoise box. “I know this is a little soon, and you’d probably appreciate something more planned out…” 

He’s down on one knee and he doesn’t even finish the sentence, she doesn’t even let him ask the question because she’s shouting yes and kissing him, and only once she has the ring on does she notice how beautiful it is. 

She cries a little and they kiss a lot, and then she flops back down on the bed and looks at the ring again. It’s perfect in every way. It suits her in the way the one she wore before never did.

“Did Betty help you pick it out?” she asks.

“Yes. Is that a problem?” Archie’s blushing now.

“No. She just has better taste than you.” Veronica notices that Archie’s gone quiet. “Wait, did you think it would be a problem?”

“Yes.” Archie says with a shrug. “Other girlfriends were not that fond of her, or Jug to be honest.”

Veronica laughs. “It probably helps that I fell for them first. Platonically speaking.”

“Yeah. I figured that much out.” Archie says. 

“I love you.” she says, feeling the weight of each word as she says it. “I love you so much.”

***

Jughead groans “How many selfies is V going to send you of that damn ring?”

“As many as she wants.” Betty says. She’s curled into his side. They’ve got the back window open, so it’s not too stuffy in the room. There is a nice breeze, and the lights are off. Betty’s face is illuminated by the light of her cell phone. Betty turns it off. 

“It is a big deal.” Jughead says. He’s not really thinking about Archie marrying Veronica, but of Veronica officially being part of their lives for as long as they all shall live, presumably. He likes Veronica a lot more than pretty much anyone else who isn’t in his de facto family already. 

“It is. But you know how you always say that the three musketeers actually involved four people?”

“Yes.” Jughead says, a little surprised by the change in topic. 

“Veronica’s our fourth person. She makes us the three musketeers.” 

When Betty phrases it like that, he gets it a little better. “So what you’re saying is that we’re finally complete?”

“Exactly.” Betty adds after a pause, “Besides I don’t know how much longer the kids were going to buy the lie we told them about Archie’s string of women.”

“You mean that they were overnight music students? I don’t think Thea bought that ever.”

“Really?” Betty says propping herself up on one arm. 

“I think they both inherited their investigative skills from us.” Jughead says.

“Not Elliot, he spent a whole day trying to solve the mystery of his missing chocolate bar and finally gave up, even though Thea had chocolate on her face when he asked her about it.”

Jughead laughs and shakes his head, “I hope Max and Elliot get to keep the friendship they have, the way we’ve kept ours with Archie.”

A bittersweet look crosses Betty’s face for a moment, although Jughead can’t make it out. It’s pretty dark in their room. “It won’t ever be the same for them, they will never need each other like we did, at least I hope not.”

“Why not?” 

“Because you and I were born without real families, it just took us a while to figure that out. We needed Archie, Fred, and each other to feel sane. Our children don’t need that the same way.”

Jughead sighs. Sometimes because of how wonderful their life has turned out to be, with dream jobs, a nice house, and goofy children, - he forgets what came before, what forged Betty and he together, into the strongest of structures. 

But the Betty and Jughead who grew up hiding in back rooms and sneaking meals for completely different reasons, couldn’t even imagine what their futures would hold. They might not have made it there, but for Archie and Fred.

Over the next month Jughead discovers that he had every reason to be leery of Archie and Veronica getting engaged. Not because it makes Veronica more involved in their lives, but because of the wedding itself. It turns out that Veronica wants this wedding to be even more fabulous than her first, which involved no fewer than three different live bands. 

Now of course she’s operating on less of a budget, but that doesn’t stop Veronica from buying a dress that costs more than Jughead’s car. But that doesn’t bother Jughead, how other people spend their money is none of his damn business.

It’s the amount of help and time she is taking from Betty as part of this whole wedding ordeal that is his business. He moans about it, both to Betty and to the Bridezilla herself, but neither take him too seriously. Jughead thinks the whole thing is silly. Betty is too old to be the maid of honor. He is smart enough not to voice this particular thought out loud. 

Which leads Jughead to his second complaint. He has no desire to be the best man. More importantly he has less than zero interest in throwing a bachelor party. Thankfully, Jughead has a personal assistant at work and he makes her put together the actual plans for the event, but Jughead still has to show up for the event itself. 

It’s a pub crawl, with no strippers, but way too many dude bros and an increasingly drunk Archie. Jughead has locked everyone’s phones away for the festivities, including his own. He’s also not drinking, so he’s beyond bored and a little grumpy by the end of the night when he loads a completely sloshed Archie into the passenger’s seat of his car, and heads towards home. The other guys making their way home in an uber.

“Jug! Jug! Jug!” Archie slurs.

“Yeah Arch?” Jughead’s at a stop light so he glances over to look at Archie. He’s slumped against the door, his seat belt still on, his eyes red rimmed. 

“I’m scared!”

“Of what?”

“Spending the rest of my life with one person. Commitment is scary.”

Jughead laughs “I’m the wrong person to ask.” 

“Why?” Archie slurs and Jughead wonders how drunk he really is, but then Archie clarifies “Is it because you’ve been together with Betty since middle school?” 

“Kind of.” And then because Jughead sees no reason not to tell Archie this, he adds. “We took a break once. When we first went to college. Alice was being such a bitch and Betty felt like she needed space to figure things out, and we both thought that that was the right thing to do. Give each other space to figure things out on our own.” 

Even decades later Jughead remembers this as a dark time. He and Betty were still friends, they were still living together, just as roommates, but there was this whole part of his soul he felt cut off from. He felt like he was pretending to be single, pretending to be someone he was not. 

Since at that point Archie didn’t acknowledge their relationship in the first place, neither of them talked to him about it. Back then they felt so mature, like they were doing the right thing, the adult thing, because who ends up with their middle school sweetheart?

“So what, you just got back together when I started dating Sabrina?”

“No. We didn’t even last that long without each other. About two weeks before that we got back together.”

“Oh. I’m actually a little relieved that you’ve kissed someone that isn’t Betty.” Archie’s sitting up now, like the conversation is reviving him a little. 

Jughead chuckles, “Oh no, don’t go that far. I tried dating, Betty tried dating, but outside of a few awkward cups of coffee that was that.”

“Oh.” Archie says, he sounds a little disappointed by the lack of scandal. “How come you’re not like, super bored?” When Jughead doesn’t answer the question, Archie clarifies. “In bed. Doesn’t it get really, really boring?”

Jughead feels his face turn bright red. Of all the words to describe his sex life, that was definitely not one that came to mind, even remotely. “No.”

“Why not?”

“Drunk Archie is asking a question that sober Archie really doesn’t want to know the answer to. So as sober Arche’s best friend, I’m not going to answer it.”

 

“Noooo!”Archie whines.

Sober Archie never asks Jughead the question.

The wedding itself is awful from Jughead’s perspective, full of stiff collars and formal words, but he got married in a court house with a drunk outside the room, so who is he to judge? Besides, Archie and Veronica are happy, beyond that even. 

Thea, Elliot, and Max all seem equally as thrilled. Each of them has a role in the wedding itself. Thea is a bridesmaid, and Max is the ring bearer, and Elliot is assistant to the ring bearer (a position Jughead’s pretty sure Veronica has cooked up out of the kindness of her heart). 

It goes late and Betty and Jughead bring all three kids home with them. After loading them into bed, Jughead and Betty share a slice of wedding cake in the kitchen.

“I’m so glad we skipped all that.” Betty says. Jughead clinks his fork against hers, in his own version of cheers. 

It turns out that the old adage is true. First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes a baby in a very expensive, hand-made in the USA baby carriage. Veronica and Archie welcome Paris Andrews to the world a year later and Jughead’s baby gift is keeping his mouth shut about the name they chose. 

“Jug, it’s Paris as in France. I don’t think there is anything wrong with that.” Betty says.

“Then why do I keep thinking Paris as is Hilton?” 

But as much as Jughead loathes the name, he loves the baby. He steals any opportunity he has to cuddle it and Veronica affectionately calls him a “baby slut.” Still he doesn’t try to talk Betty into having another one, because it’s much easier to just borrow one. 

It turns out that generally having Veronica around is a huge bonus, once they’re past the wedding stage. She makes Archie so happy and she helps curb Betty’s perfectionist tendency, she even encourages Jughead to make pretentious literary references. 

Only in retrospect does Jughead fully realize how much Archie needed Veronica. He doesn’t know why it took him so long to figure it out. After all, Jughead was a sane and legitimate member of society because of his partner. 

Instead of three friends that share everything from child care to drunken song writing sessions (ok, that only happened once, but it was memorable), they’ve become four friends, who swap children and chores and meals, and share a whole lot of time and more than a few vacations.

Twenty years down the line, when it’s impossible to not think of Veronica as one of the three musketeers, when Elliot and Max kiss in their parents shared backyard and walk to a beautifully restored old mustang under sprinkles of confetti and cheering, Jughead and Archie hug each other. They may not share a last name, but their sons do now. 

Family is made by choice, Jughead thinks. When they officially sell the consulting business in their early sixties instead of writing another true crime book, he and Betty sit down together in the above garage suite turned studio and craft a book of fairy-tales and friendship for their first grandchild. Archie records a companion CD with Veronica providing vocals.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So thankful for comments. I'm going to the dental surgeon this afternoon, so I really want/need/am eternally grateful for having something to look forward.

**Author's Note:**

> I am so grateful for any comments and feedback! Please tell me if I made you laugh.


End file.
